Dr.

María Tausiet1
Independent Scholar, Madrid - mariatausiet@gmail.com
Artículo recibido: 28/12/2017 - aceptado: 20/01/2018

BRIGID’S FIFTY-SEVEN DEMONS:

EXORCISM AS MIRACLE IN ZARAGOZA, 1601

Resumen1
Entre las relaciones de milagros atribuidos a la intercesión de la Virgen del Pilar, destaca

Miríada Hispánica, 16: pp. 109-120

la información sobre los exorcismos realizados en 1601 en Zaragoza a una mujer que ya
había peregrinado previamente a varios monasterios en busca de remedio para su mal. Según
confesión propia, Brígida estaba poseída por tres demonios y atormentada por cincuenta y
cuatro más que la acosaban en forma de moscones. Aunque se trata de un relato breve, su
riqueza e intensidad expresiva lo convierten en un documento excepcional para el análisis de
las creencias acerca de la posesión demoníaca y la liberación de ésta entendida como milagro.

Palabras clave: Milagros—Exorcismo—Brujería—Peregrinación—Virgen del Pilar

Abstract
Among the reports of miracles attributed to the intercession of  Our Lady of the Pillar in
Zaragoza (Spain), the story of Brígida Pérez is particularly notable. She spent three years
on pilgrimage to different holy sites seeking a remedy for her ailments. By her own avowal,
Brígida had been possessed by three demons and was continually tormented by fifty-four
others that had assumed the form of large flies. Although the surviving account of her story is
brief, its fascinating wealth of detail makes it an exceptional source when it comes to analysing

1
María Tausiet is an independent scholar who has worked as a researcher for the CSIC (Spanish National
Research Council) in Madrid, and more recently has been invited as Scholar in Residence at the University of
Virginia. Her research focuses on Early modern and Contemporary Spanish Religious History. She has publi-
shed books on witchcraft, religion, magic, demonic possession and the history of emotions, as well as a number
of articles about different aspects of the Catholic Reformation. Her latest books are El dedo robado. Reliquias
imaginarias en la España Moderna [The Purloined Finger. Imaginary Relics in Early Modern Spain], (Abada,
2013), and Urban Magic in Early Modern Spain. Abracadabra Omnipotens (Palgrave, 2014). She is currently
doing research on relics, ghosts, the notion of immortality and its depiction in scientific and fantastical repre-
sentations of the afterlife. See also http://seronoser. free.fr/maria/.

Brigid’s fifty-seven demons: exorcism as miracle in Zaragoza, 1601 109

 Early Modern Catholic beliefs about demonic possession, its relationship with witchcraft, and
the supposed miracle of exorcism.

Key words: Miracles—Exorcism—Witchcraft—Pilgrimage—Virgin of the Pillar.

“La possession est une scène, alors que

la sorcellerie est un combat.”2

The miracle story as an independent literary genre, distinct from the lives of the saints,
began to flourish in Europe in the 12th century. At the same time, the practice of
worshipping the Virgin Mary and the marvels attributed to her powers of intercession
was becoming more widespread. Various compilations of tales of exceptional events, the
so-called miracles of St. Mary, started to appear in different countries (England, France,
Germany, Italy, Spain), although in most cases they gave accounts of the same stereotypical
stories with minor variations. In the late Middle Ages, however, certain religious centres
(including several in Spain, such as the Monasteries of Montserrat and Guadalupe, the
Sanctuary of Peña de Francia and the Basilica of our Lady of the Pillar in Zaragoza) began
Miríada Hispánica, 16: pp. 109-120

to document stories of local miracles that had occurred much closer to home.3

Despite their depiction of extraordinary events, these literary miracle tales, successors
to the moralising medieval exempla, were presented as “true stories”, in which everyday
life was interrupted by the most unusual happenings. Often told in minute detail, they
made a considerable impact, helping to propagate faith in the redemptive power of
the church or monastery in question and thereby attracting pilgrims in ever greater
numbers. Generally speaking, the clerics responsible for a particular sanctuary would
write up a narrative after questioning both the person who benefited from a miracle and
any witnesses to the events. Two agents, therefore, had to cooperate in the elaboration
of a miracle story: on the one hand, the pilgrims, flattered by the fact that an episode
in their life might be worthy of such attention, and on the other, the churchmen who,
with their questions and comments, pointed narrators in a particular direction and later
revised, re-ordered, and adapted their testimony before writing up a definitive version
of the tale.

As time went on, miracle stories became further and further removed from the original
story. From the mid-sixteenth century onwards, most were primarily concerned with

2
Michel de Certeau, L’écriture de l’histoire, Paris, Gallimard, 1978, 250.
3
On miracles in medieval and Early Modern Europe, see Twelftree and Walsham. On miracles in Spain, see
Crémoux, Castellote, Montoya Martínez and Vizuete-Mendoza. On miracles in Zaragoza, see Domingo Pérez
y Serrano Martín.

110 Dr. María Tausiet

praising the figure of Mary and demonstrating that the advocation in question was
particularly blessed with divine favour. Miracle stories were not simply records of
wondrous events, they were detailed narratives of pilgrimages, from the arrival of
pilgrims at their chosen sanctuary, to the moment at which they were granted the divine
intervention for which they had journeyed there (Crémoux 24-29).

Among the many stories of miracles attributed to Zaragoza’s Virgin of the Pillar, one in
particular stands out – a handwritten account of a long series of exorcisms carried out
in 1601 on a woman called Brígida Pérez. She lived in the village of Vera de Moncayo
(“vera” means “side”, because the village was on the side of a mountain), and had already
undertaken several pilgrimages to other churches in search of a cure. According to the
tale, for over two years she had been possessed by three demons and tormented by
another fifty-four who had taken on the form of huge flies.4

Given that this was an exemplary tale, its primary objective was to highlight the woman’s
miraculous cure. However, unlike other similar testimonies, there is a certain lack of clarity
about that cure because the standard happy ending is missing. Despite repeatedly stating

Miríada Hispánica, 16: pp. 109-120

that the demons would leave the woman’s body on a given day, the narrative comes to an
abrupt end while the unfortunate victim is still in the throes of possession. That said, the
details that do survive are more than sufficient to allow us to establish the life story of a
woman whose symptoms seemed to suggest an archetypal case of demonic possession:5
She was in the habit of fainting, first suffering a shivering around the shoulders, hands and face […]
sometimes her head and eyes were afflicted, to the point that she lost her sight; sometimes it was her
stomach and heart, and on other occasions she endured very bad back pain. (ACP, 1-1-2-4, f. 1r.)

She was clearly suffering from a profound state of depression that might have led her not
only to have “blasphemous fantasies,” but even to contemplate the possibility of ending

4
See Archivo Capitular del Pilar (A.C.P.), Zaragoza, Sig. 1-1-2-4. There is a transcription of the document in
Tomás Domingo Pérez and Ester Casorrán Berges, El milagro de Calanda y otros favores extraordinarios de Nuestra
Señora del Pilar, Zaragoza, Cabildo Metropolitano, 2013, 140-149.
5
There is a wide bibliography on demonic possession and exorcism. Among them, see: Armando Maggi, Satan’s
Rhetoric: A Study of Renaissance Demonology, Chicago, University of Chicago Press, 2001; María Tausiet, Los posesos
de Tosos (1812-1814). Brujería y justicia popular en tiempos de revolución, Zaragoza, Instituto Aragonés de Antropolo-
gía, 2002, and Idem, “Patronage of Angels & Combat of Demons: Good versus Evil in 17th Century Spain”, in Peter
Marshall & Alexandra Walsham (eds.), Angels in the Early Modern World, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press,
2006, 233-255; Nancy Caciola, Discerning Spirits: Divine and Demonic Possession in the Middle Ages, New York,
Cornell University Press, 2003; Charles Zika, Exorcizing Our Demons: Magic, Witchcraft and Visual Culture in Early
Modern Europe, Leiden, Brill, 2003; Sarah. Ferber, Demonic Possession and Exorcism in Early Modern France, New
York, Routledge, 2004; Hilaire Kallendorf, Exorcism and its Texts: Subjectivity in Early Modern Literature of England
and Spain, Toronto, University of Toronto, 2004; Moshe. Sluhovsky, Believe Not Every Spirit. Possession, Mysticism &
Discernment in Early Modern Catholicism, Chicago, The University of Chicago Press, 2007, and Brian. P. Levack, The
Devil Within. Possession and Exorcism in the Christian West, New Haven and London, Yale University Press, 2013.

Brigid’s fifty-seven demons: exorcism as miracle in Zaragoza, 1601 111

 her own life. Most interestingly, however, is the fact that although she sought consolation
in the church, “saying confession and receiving communion from her priest”, this was
not initially assumed to be a case of demonic possession. In fact, the suspicion was that
her suffering had been caused by frequent disagreements with her step-aunt.

The reason behind these rows is not entirely clear, but what we do know is that – in something
of a twist on a classic fairy tale – Brígida’s widowed father had remarried, but when his second
wife also died, her sister had begun to show a marked animosity towards Brígida. Reading
between the lines, this was all about money and the father’s final will, because if Brígida had
no children, his estate would pass to the children of his second wife. In the narrative, the
“wicked step-aunt” was being demonised as a witch, in absolutely stereotypical terms: “The
abovementioned woman had made a pact 35 or 40 years [ago] with the devil, who appeared
to her in the shape of a pig, and in those years she served him by harming babies and carrying
out other deeds associated with witchcraft” (Ib., f. 1v.). Continuing in the same vein, the
account goes on to claim that she had cast a spell against Brígida:

On 3 April in the year 1599 […] she took three or four hairs from the back of the said
Miríada Hispánica, 16: pp. 109-120

Brígida’s neck, and having used these to bind together some blades of grass she had
plucked on the mountainside, she uttered certain words, ordering the devil to do all the
harm he could to the said Brígida, until he compelled her to kill herself. (Ib., ff. 1v-2r.)

According to Brígida, her aunt had hidden the abovementioned charm –something
seemingly as simple as a few hairs and blades of grass– beneath one of the roof-tiles
on the house in which she lived with her husband. The proof furnished was that the
couple “heard a noise on many nights” coming from a certain part of the roof. Three
weeks later, the spell seems to have taken effect: the account tells us that Brígida began
to be tormented by no fewer than fifty-seven demons. Three of them were lodged inside
her (possession), while the others confined themselves to torturing her from without
(obsession): “On 23 April, three demons entered her body; the first was called Nicol,
the second Leleel, the third Natanaal, and fifty-four stayed outside, tormenting the said
Brígida and generally appearing to her in the shape of large flies” (Ib., f. 2r.).

That day proved to be a pivotal moment in the young woman’s life. It was then that she
left her home and began to travel to different sanctuaries with her husband. In so doing,
she was continuing a tradition dating back to medieval times whereby certain women who
were either visionaries or victims of possession (Margery Kempe being the most famous
example) began to lead an itinerant existence in search of spiritual health and healing.6

6
On Margery Kempe, see Kim Phillips, “Margery Kempe and the age of Woman.” A Companion to The Book
of Margery Kempe, John Arnold and Kathleen Lewis (eds.), Woodbridge: D.S. Brewer. 2004, 17–34, and Salus-

112 Dr. María Tausiet

The dates the narrative gives for the most important stages in Brígida’s unhappy journey
are particularly significant. It cannot be a coincidence that she is said to have become
possessed on 23 April. Firstly, this is the feast-day of St. George, patron saint of the
Crown of Aragon and symbol of the victory of faith over evil, as represented by his
legendary defeat of the devil in the guise of a dragon. Secondly, as Chaucer notes in The
Canterbury Tales, April is a month of gentle weather, a marked contrast with a long, hard
winter. As the birds begin to make melody, so do people feel the urge to go on pilgrimages
and seek out distant shrines in distant lands. Brígida, like Chaucer’s pilgrims, is therefore
supposed to have begun her journey in late April.

It is surely not by chance, either, that, as we are told at the start of a chronicle aimed
at glorifying Our Lady of the Pillar, the young woman’s “melancholy and sadness”
apparently began to manifest themselves in the month of the Virgin and specifically on
“the first day of the Litany”. The Litaniae lauretanae (Litany of Loreto, after its place of
origin) is comprised of a poetic series of petitions to Mary, praising her as a “tower of
ivory,” the “health of the sick,” and “comforter of the afflicted,” and so on, titles that are
often added to rosary prayers. Such litanies had been proliferated by the end of the 16th

Miríada Hispánica, 16: pp. 109-120

century and in order to stop people from uttering inappropriate, false, or even dangerous
expressions of praise, Pope Clement VIII decided to prohibit all but the “official” forms
of Marian prayer (which included the Litany of Loreto). He published his decree on
litanies in 1601, the same year in which Brígida’s miracle story was written. As if these
coincidences were not enough, the narrative also specifies that, after travelling to various
other religious centres, Brígida and her husband reached Zaragoza on Thursday 1 June
1601, which just happened to be Ascension Day, forty days after Easter Sunday.7

The intent of setting the possessed woman’s spiritual journey within a liturgical
framework can be seen throughout the text. We are told that she spent exactly nine days
in each sanctuary, absorbed in a devotional period of intense prayer, a pattern repeated
on a regular basis over the space of almost two years. She is said to have offered novenas
(prayers repeated for nine successive days, a practice that had become increasingly
common since the late 16th century) at three prestigious centres of pilgrimage, her
intention being to travel on until she reached a hermitage close to the French border. En
route, however, she and her husband decided to stay in Zaragoza long enough to offer
a novena to the Virgin of the Pillar. Such importance is conceded to these periods of
prayer by the author of her miracle story that, in order to memorialize everything that

tiano Moreta Velayos (ed.), Libro de Margery Kempe. La mujer que se reinventó a sí misma, Valencia, Universitat
de València, 2012.
7
On litanies, see Angelo de Santi, “Litany of Loreto”, in The Catholic Encyclopedia, vol. 9, Nueva York, Ro-
bert Appleton Company, 1910: http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/09287a.htm

Brigid’s fifty-seven demons: exorcism as miracle in Zaragoza, 1601 113

 happened (almost certainly over a longer timespan) to the prescribed nine days, he gets
various dates and days of the week wrong.8

The spectacular nature of the exorcisms that would be performed on Brígida in Zaragoza
is heightened by the fact that they became the culmination of a sequence of similar
practices she had endured at the other stops on her pilgrimages. Although the manuscript
lacks detail about the exorcisms carried out in other places, which were effectively just a
prelude to the Zaragoza miracle, the few snippets given are absolutely fascinating. There
is a hint, for example, that the couple’s initial decision to go to the Monastery of Piedra
was based on the fact that it was famous for possessing a relic of St Bartholomew which
had the power to cure the demonically possessed (Vorágine, 524).

Ever since the early Middle Ages, St. Bartholomew had been closely associated with exorcism,
but he was little known in Spain until the late 16th century. He was said to have suffered
one of the cruellest martyrdoms imaginable: having converted Armenia’s pagan king to
Christianity, he was ordered to be flayed alive by the king’s brother. Relics, in the form of what
were supposedly pieces of his skin, then appeared across Europe, including, perhaps, Piedra.
Miríada Hispánica, 16: pp. 109-120

It may be, however, that Brígida was actually drawn to this Cistercian monastery by the fame
of another relic, a piece of the host known as Santa Duda (Holy Doubt). According to local
tradition, in 1380 it had miraculously bled whwn the priest officiating over communion
doubted the miracle of transubstantiation. A magnificent reliquary was therefore built to
house order the eucharistic host, and its doors would be opened for the many pilgrims who
came to the monastery in the hope of being cured by the relic’s powers (González Zymla 19).

Brígida offered up her first novena in Piedra, whose monks attempted to exorcise her. Despite
the community’s efforts to help, however, her condition was not to improve. After her nine
days of prayer she believed she was cured and set out for home, but upon reaching her village
began to suffer the same “torment” as before, especially when she went to worship at the
local church. Despite the author of the account’s vested interest in interpreting her suffering
from a religious perspective, there is a telling note in the margin of the manuscript that offers
a complementary secular reading: “Suspecting there to be an illness, they summoned two
doctors, both of whom visited her on several occasions over the course of a year, more or less,
giving her remedies for melancholy and other such things” (ACP, 1-1-2-4, f. 2v.).

When medicine proved no help either, Brígida left home again in search of a cure. This time
she did not go very far, deciding to offer another novena at the Monastery of Veruela, just
outside her village. Having been treated by its monks, she went home again, but her suffering

8
On novenas, see Joseph Hilgers, “Novena”, in The Catholic Encyclopedia, vol. 11, New York, Robert Apple-
ton Company, 1911: http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/11141b.htm

114 Dr. María Tausiet

continued. Refusing to resign herself to her fate, a few months later she set off on a third
pilgrimage, this time to the church of Saints Cosmos and Damian in Arnedo (La Rioja).
These two reputed healers and martyrs were the Christianised versions of Castor and Pollux,
heroes of pagan mythology in whose sanctuaries the practice of incubatio had been carried
out since the fourth century, at least in the Byzantine world. As was true of many other saints,
the level of veneration of Cosmos and Damian increased in Spain after the Council of Trent,
and by the time Brígida decided to travel to La Rioja, they had already earned a considerable
reputation for curing the possessed (Gonzalo Moreno 55-69).

According to the manuscript, she and her husband spent another nine-day period
in Arnedo, going to the church every day for Brígida to undergo exorcism. However:
“Although in the said village, through the intercession of the said martyrs, many are cured
who arrive with similar travail [crossed out below: with this ailment], despite all this, in his
judgement Our Lord did not bestow his mercy upon her” (ACP, 1-1-2-4., f. 2v ).

Once again, therefore, the couple went back to their village, this time staying at home for
three months, during which time Brígida’s state of health showed no sign of change. This

Miríada Hispánica, 16: pp. 109-120

period of psychological stagnation was broken in 1599 after the appointment of a new
bishop to the see to which the village of Vera belonged. This was none other than Diego
de Yepes, a seventy-year-old monk who had been prior of eight monasteries, confessor
to St Teresa of Ávila and to king Philip II, until the latter’s death in 1598. Yepes, one of
the most influential clerics in Spain at this time, wrote a memorable account of the last
months of the king’s life and his exemplary death, a piece of writing that later inspired
Cervantes’ description of Don Quixote’s death. In recognition of the spiritual support
Yepes had given his father, Philip III named him bishop of Tarazona. This led to a period
of intense activity in the diocese as Yepes established himself as a strict defender of
the orthodox faith and an enthusiastic supporter of the Counter Reformation, taking a
personal interest in many local matters (Mancini Giancarlo 136-58).

As it turned out, the new bishop ended up treating the two women in this story – both
the demoniac (Brígida) and the witch (her step-aunt). It is worth remembering here
that Yepes was appointed to this role at the height of the witch craze in Spain. While
there is no surviving documentary evidence of any witchcraft trials held in his diocese,
we do have a record of a pastoral visit to the village of Vera in 1601, which contains
some enthralling details. That visit was to prove a turning point in the story of Brígida’s
possession, because Yepes ordered that both women involved be taken to the capital of
the diocesis, Tarazona. The step-aunt was then incarcerated in the episcopal prison on
suspicion of witchcraft, while the bishop showed great interest in helping the niece – not
only did he put her in the hands of various exorcists, he even got so personally involved
as to perform exorcisms on her himself.
Brigid’s fifty-seven demons: exorcism as miracle in Zaragoza, 1601 115
 Whatever solace Brígida may have gained from the attention paid to her in Tarazona,
her travels did not end there. She and her husband decided to go back on the road and
continue their search for a cure. Their next destination was a shrine dedicated to St.
Juliana of Nicomedia, a fourth-century virginal martyr renowned for curing demonic
possession. Tradition had it that, like St. Bartholomew, Juliana had faced the devil in
a series of fierce battles during her life, but eventually defeated him and thereafter led
him around by a chain like a lapdog. Juliana’s story spread far and wide throughout the
Middle Ages as did images of her as the archetypal strong woman, leading a winged devil
by a chain. In fact, it was the idea of being cured by a similar chain rather than by a relic
of the saint as such that drew pilgrims to her shrine (Vorágine 174).

Whether Brígida ever reached St. Juliana’s shrine remains a mystery, however, because our
narrative focuses primarily on the time she spent in what should have been the halfway
point – the city of Zaragoza, where she stayed for at least ten days. During this time, clerics
from various churches and members of the city’s Jesuit College did all they could to help
bring her suffering to an end. Every morning she would go to the Chapel of the Basilica
Miríada Hispánica, 16: pp. 109-120

of our Lady of the Pillar to be exorcised. This chapel, a narrow, rectangular, windowless
building was linked to the main church but functioned as an independent religious space.
On her very first day there, the exorcists certified that she was indeed possessed by the devil,
“because she understood very well and spoke the Hebrew tongue, because she displayed
great feats of strength, and for other reasons”. (Domingo Pérez and Casorrán Berges 144).
On the fourth day, on the advice of several clergymen, the formulas of exorcism laid out in
chapter VI of the second part of the Malleus Maleficarum were read out to her.

According to this notorious treatise, these were the words that must be used in the most
difficult of cases, namely when exorcising those who had been bewitched. These individuals
were required to make their confession, take communion, carry a lit candle and, finally, “be
tied, naked, to a blessed paschal candle, of a length equal to that of the body of Christ or
the holy cross” (Mackay 452). Brígida apparently complied with the first three conditions
but no details are given about the fourth. Whatever the case may be, according to the
manuscript, on the sixth day the fifty-four demons that had been tormenting her from
without (flies!) were finally banished. The most spectacular exorcisms were yet to come,
however, as the three demons possessing her from within remained.

It was on the seventh day, at three in the afternoon, that the most astonishing act of the
entire ritual took place. In an attempt to channel the charismatic powers of the twelve
apostles, whose gift for exorcism was acknowledged in the gospels, twelve of Zaragoza’s
leading clerics shut themselves away with the unfortunate Brígida and her demons in the
gloomy chapel, presumably ready to use the Church’s full armoury in order to defeat the
three last demons. Significantly, the ceremony, orchestrated by the rector of the Jesuit
116 Dr. María Tausiet
College and an assistant, boasted the presence of a number of relics of St. Ignatius of
Loyola and his successor, Diego Laínez. At the start of proceedings, the rector read aloud
a report about a supposed miracle performed posthumously by Ignatius, as a result of
which four possessed women in Modena had been cured (Guillausseau 5-56).

Meanwhile, Brígida “was crying out and uttering loud complaints similar to those that
were read about in the said miracle story” (Domingo Pérez and Casorrán Berges 146).
She was therefore ordered to bow down and kiss the ground, firstly “in honour of Father
Ignatius and then in honour of Diego Laínez, which she duly did, albeit still with “many
cries and complaints” (Domingo Pérez and Casorrán Berges 146). Then, after she had
been made to say confession, and the Miserere and various prayers to the Virgin Mary had
been recited, the exorcism proper began. This entailed interrogating the afflicted woman,
or more accurately – as can be seen from the manuscript – the three demons who were
possessing her: Leleel, Natanael and Nicol. The first questions were directed at Leleel,
the least important of the three, because the previous day he had answered more readily
than the other two. When asked how he and his two companions had entered the young

Miríada Hispánica, 16: pp. 109-120

woman’s body, he replied that it was thanks to a spell cast by her aunt. We already know
the rest of the story. What is most disturbing here is the description of Brígida’s behaviour:
one moment, apparently, she was uttering loud bursts of laughter and chatting freely, the
next she was exhibiting “the greatest indignation […] with much shouting and crying
aloud” (Domingo Pérez and Casorrán Berges 146). The Jesuit priest therefore told her to
kneel and kiss the ground again, in honour of God, Our Lady of the Pillar, St. Ignatius and
Diego Laínez and also St. Ambrose of Milan. She obeyed, but “most reluctantly” and “with
great recalcitrance” (Domingo Pérez and Casorrán Berges 147).

The questions directed at the second demon, who “was in a fury […] saying that he wanted
to trample all those present”, focused on the charm that the step-aunt had supposedly created
by taking four hairs from the back of Brígida’s neck. Having been given this information, the
priests touched an image of St. Ignatius against the back of her head, to which she (or the
demon) replied: “I don’t want you, I don’t want you” (Domingo Pérez and Casorrán Berges
147). Every time she rejected something sacred, they told her to prostrate herself and kiss the
image of Ignatius. Finally, they asked the demon when he would leave her body, and whether
his two companions would leave with him. He replied, as we might have expected, that
all three would leave her the following Saturday in the first hour of the morning –in other
words, on the day of the week dedicated to the Virgin and the last day of the novena, during
the Children’s Mass celebrated to honour Our Lady of the Pillar.

As if attempting to convince Brígida of just how important it was that she do what was
expected of her, the clerics asked both the second and third demons to corroborate not only
the time and place at which they would leave her body, but also the form in which they
Brigid’s fifty-seven demons: exorcism as miracle in Zaragoza, 1601 117
 would do it: “per secessum et sine lesione Brigidae et alicuius personæ” (Domingo Pérez
and Casorrán Berges 148), i.e., literally “from below” (that is, defecated) without harm to
Brígida or any other person (and not “vomited”, as it was perhaps thought more typical).
And they also said that the signs they would show, as proof that they had left her body, would
be extinguishing a candle on the altar and giving four loud knocks on the main door of the
church. As the exorcisms continued and the same questions were repeated, Brígida – or one
of the demons, in this case Nicol – proved “most recalcitrant” (“Have they not already told
you this?”), but the clerics used exorcism and relics over and over again until they “compelled”
her to submit to the pre-established script (Domingo Pérez and Casorrán Berges 148).

Towards the end of the ceremony, Brígida was told to kneel and recite the Magnificat, which
she did, albeit “with wild shrieks and grimaces,” especially as she said the words referring to
Mary’s humility: “My soul doth magnify the Lord […] for he hath regarded the lowliness of his
handmaiden.” After this, a Te Deum was sung and the crowd of worshippers who had gathered
on the bank of the River Ebro to watch the spectacle said an Ave Maria. Then Brígida was asked
to return to the chapel, but she resisted so fiercely that two priests had to take her by the arms
Miríada Hispánica, 16: pp. 109-120

and drag her there (“she refused to the last to go back, saying that she did not want to go back”).
Finally, the last sentence in the document tells us that “on entering the Chapel, she uttered
several loud cries before the image of the Virgin” (Domingo Pérez and Casorrán Berges 148).

To conclude, it seems very likely that, as stated on the first page of the manuscript, the
account was left unfinished. Later versions of the same miracle story say that the exorcisms
continued on successive days and that Brígida was finally set free from her torment. The
original source, however, suggests the opposite. More than that, it takes pains to emphasise
her rebellious nature and how difficult it was for everyone who tried to make her conform.
Although such resistance is typical of the behaviour expected from the possessed, the
details of this particular case give us unique insight into a genuine episode in the life of
a tormented pilgrim. Similarly, the narrative clearly illustrates the lack of psychological
awareness and sensitivity displayed by certain clerics when it came to treating sufferers such
as Brígida. Rather than helping them, exorcism simply turned these troubled individuals
into the stars of theatrical and propagandistic spectacles (Dijkhuizen 146-150).

Convinced that the age of miracles had passed, Protestant writers at this time were
denouncing the fakery and deception practised by the Catholic Church. To them,
Brígida’s story might seem to epitomise the fact that so-called miraculous exorcisms were
simply a means of protecting certain interests that were more worldly than spiritual. On
the other hand, in the Zaragoza of 1601, a key moment in terms of protecting both
the legend of the Virgin of the Pillar and the high status of her church, the theatrics of
Brígida’s suffering and her apparent miracle cure represented the kind of cornerstone on
which such precarious causes might rest.
118 Dr. María Tausiet
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